Soi-disant

There is nothing contagious about Steven Soderbergh's current "thriller" masquerading as an intellectual's version of "28 Days Later", "Contagion". The best thing about this movie was the marketing that got me into the theater (including the seriously star-studded roster of actors who must have long been stashed in Soderbergh's favor bank or who simply can't read). At its best, "Contagion" felt like a 120-minute long news reel, albeit, with headlines harkening dusty topics including:

Swine flu;
Bird flu;
The rainforest;
Katrina;
A black man in a position of power;
Santization gear a'la E.T.;
Surgical masks in public;
Chaos, looting and general public displays of animal instinct;
Cheating on your husband right before you have a foam-at-the-mouth seizure and die;
The prom;
Jude Law being unattractive;
Digital cameras whose contents tell a story, alas, too late.

The coup de grace: blame it all on the Chinese.

Yes, you will walk out of this movie feeling sick.

Life sometimes can be soi-disant.
Soi-disant: --adjective
  so-called or pretended.